The pork episode of Master of None

The Aerogram has a piece out, Bacon & (Un)Belief: Religion & American Secularism in Master of None, which reviews The Master of None episode about religion. I kind of agree that it was a little unbelievable in relation to his cousin, and how quickly he became a porkoholic (I don’t think pork is superior to chicken, but that’s a matter of taste).

That being said I think it is important to note a personal aspect of Aziz Ansari’s relationship to religion. Here’s a correction to an article in The New York Times profiling Aziz:

In an earlier version of this article, Michael Schur, the co-creator of “Parks and Recreation,” partly described Mr. Ansari as a Muslim. Mr. Ansari describes himself as an atheist.

Aziz Ansari does not define himself from what I can tell as a bad or liberal Muslim. He says he’s not religious. He happens to be a guy who is an atheist, a very negatively viewed group, who is from a Muslim background, a very negatively viewed group. That is one way we have a lot in common.

Also, I had a bacon experience very similar to Aziz. Though in my case it was at a friend’s house where they were Hindus from West Bengal, and my friend was having bacon. My mom came over and I had a piece of bacon in my mouth. She was a little chagrined. She said I’m not supposed to eat pork products and not to do it again.

In general I still don’t eat much pork and ham. But I really love bacon, and have no problem with pork sausages.

Depends on what kind of pork you are getting. Male pigs that have not been castrated have what is known as ‘boar taint’, which smells and tastes offensive to a lot of people, notably East Asians, who do not eat male pigs. Female pigs taste much more mild and obviously do not have the (to them) offensive boar taint.

The taste of pork is also a function of the breed of pig, and how it is raised/what it is given to eat. In East Asia it tends to be a much leaner meat than in the West, where it is typically much fattier.

Chinese are big pork eaters, and like their pork to be (1) female and (2) lean (except for certain dishes in certain regional cuisines, like Hakka stewed pork belly, which is very fatty, but slow cooked with a lot of herbs to make it absolutely delicious, and the slow cooking renders down the fat a lot. I can recommend it as a dish eaten with white rice, if you have never had it before. Worth trying.

In Australia, I agree with you – pork tastes the worst, and I and my family simply don’t eat it there. In China we eat lots of pork, and I rate it up there with good beef for taste. Of course, I love bacon and pork sausages, but get them rarely because of my wife’s concern about the preservatives used.